


ad astra

by stanowar



Category: Love Live! School Idol Project, Love Live! Sunshine!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Not Incest, Pre-Canon, i dont know how to tag at all, i guess?, i love the kurosawas and so does my friend so here we go, this is a very pure fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-15
Updated: 2017-03-15
Packaged: 2018-10-05 14:18:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10310129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stanowar/pseuds/stanowar
Summary: Ruby, Dia, and the years in-between.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Eteerih](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eteerih/gifts).



> happy birthday liisa!! i hope this fic makes you feel the Feels(tm) atleast a little, though i can't write for shit
> 
> first fic i'm uploading online, ever. i probably messed up a lot haha
> 
> aqours is too precious ok i love them so much they're all the best and deserve only the best

Ruby had been a diligent and obedient child — always, her entire life — which was when her sister had summoned her one balmy afternoon out of absolutely _nowhere_ , she was more than willing to abandon her plate of freshly cut watermelon and glass of milkshake to be at her sister’s side.

The door to Dia’s room had already been opened, and the moment she took a step in, she was bombarded, head first, with a large poster of girls in frilly, fluffy, neon coloured costumes.

It hurt look at them first, just because of how much they _shined_.

( They reminded her of the bright blue sky and the glistering sun, and she wondered how it was possible to give off such a profound impression in just one image. )

“Look, Ruby!” Dia had exclaimed, springing from feet to feet and she excitedly yet delicately held the magazine — as if it was the most priceless thing in the world — in front of her face, “Don’t they look just _amazing_?”

Ruby agreed — they were breathtaking (literally, even, since Ruby felt like she was suffocating, in a good way) — and something about the way they posed and looked and _smiled_ made her want to be with them, dancing, singing, modelling, doing whatever _that_ was, too.

“Sis,” Ruby managed to tear her view away from the pages and looked at Dia, who gleamed like someone had just handed her a billion plates of flan, “who are these people?”

The gleam on her face froze and dropped and shattered the moment she completed the sentence, and her face morphed into one of simultaneous shock and disbelief.

“I didn’t — I didn’t tell you?”

Ruby shook her head — she had never heard of, or even seen these people before — and Dia’s expressions switched between one of self-doubt, to enlightenment straight from the heavens, to utter and absolute determination.

The way she tiptoed over to her bed and gracefully kept the magazine on it, and then turned around stomping Ruby’s way and gripped her shoulders afterwards was hilariously contradictory.

 

“Get your snacks back, you have a _lot_ to learn.”

 

* * *

 

 

The cheers of the crowds, and the final messages of the performers themselves, weren’t audible anymore — Ruby didn’t know whether it was the poor connection to the livestream or simply her tuning out everything in that moment.

Muse had just performed their final live, ever.

It was a harsh reality to swallow, and Ruby knew she wasn’t alone in the mentality when she saw her sister’s face staring at the laptop screen, complete with tears and snot, though the two of them had already prepared a dozen boxes of tissues for the occasion beforehand.

( Guess one couldn’t have the energy to wipe their face when their favourite idol group disbanded right in front of their eyes, right? )

Ruby sniffled — for the first time throughout the entire duration of the concert — and she could already feel worried glances from Dia as she gazed at the roof and and covered her mouth in an attempt to not cry.

It was deemed useless the moment she felt wet streaks on her cheeks, and the wooden roof became nothing more than a blurry muddle of brown.

( The colour reminded her of her best-loved member — the one member she always noticed more than anyone else, although no one else did much, who reminded her of spring and flowers and _onigiri_ — and she wanted nothing but to cry even more. )

It took long for the waterworks to stop — and surprisingly Dia had stopped before Ruby did, and hugged her and made circles on her back while she still cried — but they did end, eventually, though it had been a few days before she would stop tearing up any time in the day.

It felt like a huge part of her heart had just been ripped away, forcibly, and there was nothing to fill it back with.

Ruby’s family had been supportive, and she was glad because she _really_ needed all the solace she could get. Dia had been the one by her side most of the time, but her parents had been encouraging too, and they had never undermined her situation — they knew how much the group meant to her, after all.

And that was how, in the same place and time as the first occasion she learned about idols in the first place (complete with cut up watermelon and milkshake in hand, just like back then), Ruby had realised she could let go — she _had_ to let go.

The nine of them had been like stars — quite literally, sometimes, given the amount of light they radiated in each and every show — and Ruby knew quite well that stars were unreachable.

But one could still see them, appreciate them, study them, even long after they had exploded and spread into the ever expanding universe — because they were just so, so far away, and it would take millions and billions and _trillions_ of lightyears for a supernova to reach the view of someone on earth.

The group was over, but Ruby could still follow their footsteps, could still cherish them, could still aim to be someone like them — but only once she would truly let go.

When she would let go of the gaseous and dusty remains of the asterism that was once Muse.

 

Dia had popped up, out of nowhere, not just with the sole intention of stealing the sliced fruit that their mother had cut specifically for Ruby, but for providing a shoulder too, even when Ruby herself didn’t know she needed it it.

For the first time in a very long time, Ruby’s mind hadn’t drifted to disbanded idol groups and scattered remnants of novas that afternoon.

 

* * *

 

 

The two sisters spent the next few days, weeks, months, years, continuously delving into the franchise of school idols all around the country, researching further about lesser known — yet talented and deserving — groups and popular competitions, and buying more merchandise than they knew they should be.

Her room was stuffed — almost literally — and with all the posters slapped onto the wall and magazines and glow sticks and figurines lying all around, one would think of it less as a bedroom and more as a shrine.

Dia, on the other hand, hadn’t kept her room as concentrated with idol goods as Ruby had, and her room’s new look only barely resembled what it used to be a few months back.

Ruby knew why it was so — Dia would be in high school soon, after all — and it was understandable, but she still couldn’t help but feel lonely sometimes as she watched Dia lock herself into her room to cram for the exam season (at the same time they used to cosplay other idols a few months back), with a leaden calm replacing the usual pop songs that used to blast from her room day and night.

That hadn’t meant they stopped the whole fangirling thing _entirely_ , not at all, and Ruby found it surprising that her sister had still managed to spend time with her occasionally — discussing new songs or watching live shows or pretending to be their favourite idols — despite all the pressure from their parents and her school teachers to be devoting all her time to stuffing her face in textbooks rather than idol magazines.

Ruby knew it was temporary, though, because inevitably Dia would _have_ to permanently focus more on studying than anything else — especially with the coming high school years and the universally feared _nyugaku shiken_ — because out of the two of them, she was the better one at all of _that_ , and everyone expected much, much more from her than they did from Ruby.

So she began spending more of her time without Dia, because she knew she shouldn’t bother her too much at that point, and she read magazines by herself at the school library in her free time.

There, she saw this one girl often — almost everyday — sitting at the table right in the middle of the library, reading a new book every occasion Ruby caught a glimpse of her, during lunch breaks and substitutions just like she was, just not idol magazines.

The Girl, as Ruby had dubbed her, looked like a saint, _almost_ , from the angle Ruby could see her occasionally, with a small smile on her face the entire time she read books — Ruby concluded that she either read really humorous books all the time, or she just really, _really_ loved reading, whatever it may be.

It really surprised her that The Girl seemingly spent all her free time reading, which was odd considering that Ruby only did so because she didn’t exactly have anyone to be sitting with, while everyone else only came to the library to get away from the loud classes and messy corridors.

The thought of her not having any friends popped to mind, but that contradicted the fact that she definitely had the most welcoming smile Ruby had _ever_ seen, and it was more bizarre that someone _wouldn’t_ befriend a person with such a beaming smile.

( _Maybe,_ Ruby pondered, _we’re similar?_ )

Turned out, even in junior high, Ruby Kurosawa still had not developed the guts to talk to anyone besides those she knew — although most of her classmates already had, or they always could — and so she just kept sitting in that one corner of the library like always, the one with all the idol papers, and read, and read, and read until she heard the bell for the next subject ring and scurried back to her respective class.

It also turned out that she giggled while reading more often lately — she couldn’t help it, some interviews were just _that_ amusing — because it was after one particularly loud snicker that she noticed a pair of eyes staring at her just in front.

The Girl, as usual, sat in her seat, but this time with a more bewildered expression while facing Ruby, and her deer-in-the-headlights look conveyed that she had definitely not noticed Ruby sitting there (just _how_ absorbed was she into those books, that she didn’t notice someone being in the same room as her all this while?)

Ruby let out a startled whimper and covered her face with the magazine, feeling a flush of embarrassment come over her, and hoped that would be enough for The Girl to turn back to her book.

 

But, peeking from above the magazine she held, Ruby noticed that instead of returning to her land of words like she had expected, The Girl had beamed at Ruby rather than at her book.

Ruby smiled too, and she felt a warmth spread in her heart as she thought, _maybe we could be friends._

 

* * *

 

 

Dia sprang back to the world of idols faster than light, sound, and their wifi connection (which was _undeniably_ faster than the former two) all combined — and Ruby couldn’t have been happier.

Just a few weeks before summer break, Dia and her two childhood friends had conjured up the amazing idea of making an idol group themselves, right as they began their first year of high school.

It was perfect — the three had been together for a long time now, and they would be able to dance and sing and perform in sync without any difficulties — Ruby was sure of that.

Her sister had brought them over the same day she told Ruby she would be asking them about the idea, and from the excited and ecstatic looks on their faces the moment they stepped in the house, Ruby could make out that they had all mutually agreed to try it out.

( The reason behind it, she didn’t know, but she knew it didn’t matter as long as the three of them enjoyed it. )

They had plans penned down since day 1, where Kanan would be working on the lyrics and songs, Mari on the choreography, and Dia on the costumes. Ruby sat in the corner, and solved math — or attempted to, because what they were doing distracted her pretty much the entire time, and she just really, really wanted to watch.

Occasionally, Dia would reprimand her friends for using pens, and Mari for being _utterly_ clumsy (“I told you, you might stain the _tatami_!”, “It’s okay, I’ll get a _shiny_ new one for you!”, “Why did I even agree to this…”), but most of their cheery banter and discussion really drew Ruby closer.

Guess she was _literally_ coming closer, because at one point her sister was looking her way, the other two as well, and asking in confusion, “Ruby, is something wrong?”

Ruby blinked, and then she squeaked, “S-sorry! I just wanted to see…”

Dia’s expression softened, and Ruby felt a blush creep up her face as Kanan and Mari remarked ‘ _Haha, so cute_ ’ and ‘ _Dia, how could you keep this adorable puppy away from us?_ ’ respectively. At the second comment, Dia glared at the speaker for a split second, before turning back to Ruby, “You can sit with us if you want.”

She fidgeted a little, before scooting quietly to sit beside her sister and watching the trio return to their work. The jobs were difficult, Ruby already knew that from the countless interviews she read and heard and watched, but for them it would be much worse because of the remoteness of their city, and its far proximity from Tokyo and Akihabara, where most idol groups were situated.

 

“I want to help too.” Ruby thought out loud, and for once she didn’t slap her mouth shut for doing so.

Her sister replied with a smile, “Go ahead.”

 

* * *

 

 

It had been a day since Dia came back from Tokyo.

She was holed up in her room, again, her bag was thrown in one corner of the hallway, and her costume in the other (both rather harshly — Ruby knew because Dia was careful with her things, always), and her phone went off frequently from the inside of her bag, but was never answered.

The only explanation she had provided to her family was that they couldn’t sing at the event, and they left the stage without speaking a single word.

Ruby didn’t have to listen — she had watched the livestream right then, afterall — but she did anyway, and she couldn’t help but feel that the explanation was rather _lackluster_.

Sure, her sister _did_ say what actually happened, but their faces through the blurry cameras of the stream seemed to express something else —

— like they didn’t _want_ to sing.

( It was initially just on Dia’s and Kanan’s faces, while Mari still looked energetic at first — despite the injury she bore — before no one said a thing, and they left the stage unheard. )

The song was lovely, Kanan had done a great job with the music, and Mari had made sure the choreography suited the slow melody seamlessly. Dia had made the perfect costumes to go along with the rest of the project, and Ruby helped her out too.

Looking at Dia’s own costume — ribbon now crooked, and the hem of the dress seeming like it was close to being torn apart — Ruby just couldn’t understand why they _didn’t_ want to sing.

Frankly, Ruby would’ve probably done the same thing, she knew that, but the fact that her _sister_ — the stronger, and braver, more confident, and more optimistic out of the two of them — had cracked under the pressure wasn’t able to perform on stage, despite planning on dancing and singing to the song they had spent nearly all summer perfecting, just baffled her more than it worried her.

That evening, Dia’s bag had been retrieved — her costume had not.

She was talking to someone in her room — Kanan, probably, because Ruby couldn’t hear usual yelling that belonged to Mari — and Ruby didn’t mean to pry, she was just waiting for her sister to get off the phone so she could deliver her something to eat, but she heard her anyway.

Dia sighed after a statement from the other side of the line, and she replied, “It’s okay, we can talk to her tomorrow.”

“We have to end this.”

 

Ruby’s grasp on the tray faltered, and she shakily went back to the kitchen.

 

* * *

 

 

Aqours broke apart the next day.

Nobody told Ruby explicitly, but it was her, herself, that drew inferences from the behavior of the now disbanded group.

The first clue was, of course, Dia’s outfit, which had remained abandoned in that corner of the hallway, until their mother picked it up, washed it with utmost care, and handed it to Ruby instead.

( She kept it in her own closet for a very, very long time. )

Secondly, Dia’s friends didn’t come over any longer. Usually, Mari would barge — absolutely uninvited, dragging a reluctant Kanan by her side — into their house just _whenever_ , but now, Ruby didn’t even see her around her sister _outside_ their house.

Lastly, Dia’s room was completely and thoroughly devoid of posters, scrolls, or any of the other merchandise she had managed to gather all these years —

— it was all gone.

The notion of Dia giving up entirely just because of one failed live seemed so _foreign_ to Ruby, because her sister had never been one to stop when faced with hurdles, and initially she had convinced herself that it was just the stress of upcoming exams — and that everything would be back to how it was soon.

That was not the case, Ruby should’ve realised (maybe she already had, but didn’t want to accept it) and it had been confirmed to her by her sister herself while Ruby was idly skimming through old interviews a few days later, with her menacing glare and cold, cold words.

“Keep them away,” Dia didn’t even have to point out what she was referencing to, Ruby knew it weren’t just those few magazines, “I don’t want to see them.”

That night, after having relocated each and every magazine lying in her shelves, and all the merchandise that either hung on walls or sat on her desk, to the closet in the furthest corner of her room, Ruby’s mind could only drift to their past.

 _If it comforts her,_ Ruby rationalised on her bed, staring at empty walls (with the parts priorly having posters stuck on being significantly lighter) and clear desks (which were more and more school supplies, and less and less scrap papers with doodles of idols), _then I will do it_.

 

( Whether it was the difference in anticipation or suddenness, the day felt worse than when Muse had disbanded live, right in front of her eyes.

She would still rather go back to those days instead. )

 

* * *

 

 

It was the first season — or, rather, the first year — Ruby didn’t attend a single summer live, in very, very long.

She wouldn’t go, because Dia wouldn’t go (and wouldn’t let Ruby go either) — it was that simple.

It was okay, she thought, she ought to keep her mind focused on school more, anyway. Skipping out on those events this year would do no harm, as long as it insured she’d graduate junior high with good grades.

She’d be joining Uranohoshi after she was done with junior high — the same school her sister attended, as well as Kanan — after all, and she didn’t want to let her parents down in any way.

( Mari left, apparently, just after finishing her first year. The last time Ruby saw her, tears and yelling had been involved between Dia and her, in the same _tatami_ embedded room they had spent endless time working on their first (and only, it seemed) public live. )

She was glad she had at least _someone_ — Hanamaru, The Girl that she had actually managed to befriend the previous year, despite all her awkwardness and fangirling — that she knew, besides her sister, who she could sit and talk with during high school, instead of having to cling to the usual loneliness from the years before.

That summer, the two of them had spent most of their time roaming the streets and the beaches of Uchiura, talking away all afternoons and evenings as Hanamaru told Ruby about the latest books she read, and how she was offered to be the library assistant at Uranohoshi by one of her current teachers already, while Ruby only listened, because she had nothing to talk about besides idols (which she couldn’t talk about anymore), nodding her head occasionally, and guiding her friend through the wondrous world of technology that she wasn’t familiar with at all.

“Ruby,” she asked once, while the two sat by the road and watched the sunset a few days before their break would end, “weren’t you going to watch some live this month, _zura_?”

Ruby stared back at her, blankly, trying to remember what live and what time and date and when she had told Hanamaru about it, when it hit her that she had planned on attending one day from an idol tour _last year_ , with _Dia_ , _before_ all the mess with the Tokyo live.

Her face fell, she could tell from the way Hanamaru responded, “Is something wrong?”

“It’s just,” she started, pausing for a moment to think of ways to describe the entire situation, “my sister — she won’t, she won’t let me do anything idol related now.”

And Hanamaru frowned, and Ruby realised like she had talked very rudely about her own sister, “Not — not like that, she — ”

“Ruby, it’s not about that, _zura_.” she interrupted her, and Ruby hoped she wouldn’t reprimand her for sounding impolite in that one sentence, “Why would she stop you from doing something you love?”

She stared, processing the question again, and again, and again until she realised —

“I don’t know.”

Maybe it was so the two would study more, or because Dia just got bored of it and wanted Ruby to move on too, or because her very own idol group had been shattered through a cause Ruby never got to know.

Maybe, maybe, _maybe_ — they remained possibilities, because Ruby never asked, and Dia never told.

Hanamaru made this face, all knowing and wise (the other couldn’t understand how someone her own age could be so much mature than herself), and Ruby told herself, right then, that she would find out — one way or the other — and try to put the pieces of their past back together, no matter how long it took.

 

It would be okay if it ended up looking like a poor work of _kintsugi_ , because at the very least, it would be whole again, and that’s what mattered more than anything else.

 

* * *

 

The first day of high school, everything had started of with the distinct smell of _mikan_ in the school courtyard, shoving around for posters for an idol club, exactly one fallen angel _falling_ from trees and running off, and chasing after said fallen angel.

Someone in the year above hers was planning on making an idol group of her own — and Ruby really wondered if Dia would let her do that.

The group seemed interesting enough, though — the senior said they’d even hold concerts! — and the second-year had been really enthusiastic on getting Ruby and Hanamaru to join, but it was one grab of the hand that resulted in the very normal and regular _Ruby yell_ , which always happened when someone facilitated anything beyond speech at first sight with the shy girl. Then the stuff with — what was her name, Yohako? — happened, and they ran back to their respective classes.

Ruby didn’t see the two girls later in the day, and she really hoped they didn’t give up, because she still wanted her school to have an idol group of their very own (even if the last one failed).

They got a third member — a transfer student all the way from Tokyo. They held their first live, despite not being an official club, and Ruby wondered just who had allowed them to do that.

It was a little too nostalgic, though, the way the gym had barely been occupied when the three came onto stage, and how the power went out right in the middle because of the sudden, raging storm outside, and how one could hear the leader — Chika — begin sobbing and attempting to sing with her head lowered all at the same time because none of them had thought it would go that way, at all.

( Muse’s first live, the one with just the second years too, had went a lot like theirs, hadn’t it? )

Fortunately, the small crowd had been just a mistake with the timings on Chika’s part — the room was filled in a matter of seconds after the whole place went into complete darkness — and somehow the darkness itself had miraculously lifted suddenly, despite the storm outside not stopping in the in the least.

They resumed their song with the much, much bigger audience. The three members started their performance once again, this time with ten times as much energy as the first attempt.

Needless to say, it was amazing, in Ruby’s eyes, at least.

Dia had been there right after, scowling and glaring with her arms crossed, telling them that they only succeeded because of previous school idols, and because the townsfolk were kind (somehow, the speech felt more rehearsed than anything else), but their club got approved anyway (Ruby suspected it had something to do with the new director) — with their own club room and all — and Ruby followed them sometimes to find out what they were planning on next.

( The strangest thing about them so far was that _they_ were called Aqours too, and they didn’t even seem to know a thing about the original group with the same name. It wasn’t likely that any of the third years had told them about it, so it must have been a coincidence, right?

Ruby had a lingering feeling that one of them _had_ told them about it, probably indirectly. )

She wanted to join, though, and despite full-on yelling in her ears on the first day they met, Chika still wanted her to join too — but Ruby wouldn’t, because she wasn’t confident, and because Dia wouldn’t want her to.

The two first-years went to the beach again, and Ruby told Hanamaru that Dia used to love idols too, more than Ruby herself, and that she wouldn’t do things that her sister had come to hate, and that…

After Ruby paused, Hanamaru asked, “And…?”

 _That I don’t want to do it alone_ went unsaid, and instead, “Do _you_ want to be an idol, Hanamaru?”

She refused, as expected, and it was okay that way too.

“Then I’m fine not doing it either.”

She spent her time home going through the latest edition of _Dengeki G_ — she did that often lately, reading them without and away from Dia, instead of with and in front of her, like she did back in junior high — sitting alone in the room she hoped her elder sister wouldn’t check, because she didn’t prepare a cover-up in case she was found that time.

One second, her focus was on the magazine, and the other, she found herself staring across the room, and it was like they were _right there_ — sitting together and discussing their favourite member from Muse, Dia laughing, admiring Eli for being the student council president, and Ruby listening to her sister go on and on with an entire list of reasons why she loved Eli so, all with a smile on her face.

She reached out, and she didn’t understand just _how_ they could be so close, yet so _far_.

( The phrase applied both to time, and her strained relation with Dia. )

 

She missed the carefree days of elementary and junior high more than ever.

 

* * *

 

 

Ruby joined the club permanently, alongside Hanamaru, and it turned to be the most fun she had since watching _others_ do what they were doing.

It was surprising that Dia had actually let her join in the first place, even after she caught her training with them during her trial period, and Ruby really wondered what had let her to change her mind.

( She wished her sister would join too, but that seemed unlikely with the more and more school and council work piling on her shoulders. )

Yoshiko joined too — even after Dia had them realise that the whole _fallen angel_ skit would only lead them so long, and they needed something more permanent if they wanted to secure a stable spot in the rankings — and though she did look reluctant and left after the talk with the council president, the five of them managed to convince her back, after chasing her through the entire _city_ , because they were stubborn like that.

( Dia became even more lenient towards Ruby staying out with the group in the evenings, while Ruby became even more worried about Dia’s workload after the announcement of the school shutting down. )

The three first-years felt like real members and real _idols_ after they uploaded their PV based off the annual first-day-of-summer tradition in their town, where everyone in the town had been more than happy to help them add lanterns in the backdrop of the video so the video would stand out more, shining like the very own lanterns that it contained.

All their hard work in creating that PV had payed off, both landing their group to be in 99th most popular idol group, out of the 5000 in total, and to receive an invitation to perform at an event in Tokyo.

Ruby informed Dia about it, telling her all the details and how they planned on getting and staying there (Chika’s _I’ll just take extra allowance!_ didn’t seem reliable, but Ruby knew the second-year would make it all work out somehow), and _then_ asking her for permission — though she had a faint feeling that Dia would allow her even if she didn’t ask.

Dia turned around her heel, and made her way to the door.

“Does it bother you?” she asked, hurriedly, before her sister would have a chance to leave the room, “Me being a school idol, that is.”

“Ruby.” she said, without turning around, and Ruby heard that tone that Dia seemed to use more and more lately again — one that replaced the cold temper from earlier years — something akin to wisdom and patience, “You became a school idol because you wanted to, right?”

“Yeah.” she nodded, and Dia turned back around to face Ruby, taking a few steps forward, “Then it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks, right?”

“But —”

— _I thought you didn’t want me to do any of this?_

“Sorry. I’ve been harsh on you.” Dia spoke instead, “Don’t worry about it. I just…”

“Just…?” she inquired out loud, and Dia turned back around and avoided her gaze and the topic in general, “Nothing. It’s getting late, you should go to sleep.”

As her sister left the room, Ruby couldn’t help but wonder if she was remembering their own Tokyo live (the one that broke everything apart, and the one that Dia avoided talking about as if it were the plague).

The first-year pinned her hopes on their own live not turning out like how her sister’s had.

 

Luckily for her, they wouldn’t be leaving very early the next morning, and Ruby was glad for the fact, because she couldn’t get herself to sleep, at all.

Whether it was due to excitement or anxiety was up for debate in her own mind.

 

* * *

 

 

Tokyo, in short, had been a disaster.

Not because the group couldn’t sing like the original Aqours had, no — they did sing, they _sang_ the best they could, they _danced_ the best they could, they _tried_ the best they could to give a crowd-pleasing performance.

 _It wasn’t enough_ echoed in everyone’s mind when they found they hadn’t won.

As if that weren’t enough, cruel, cruel fate left them with the audience poll results by the hands of the host of the event. She looked nervous, as if she didn’t want to give them those papers, and Ruby felt her heart sink.

At the last page, it read clearly, _Aqours got 0 votes_ — and Ruby’s heart hit rock bottom.

On the ride back to Uchiura, their coach stayed an uncomfortable kind of silent (contrasting the ride _to_ Tokyo, where they had been chatting and discussing away as if there were no end to the journey), like everyone had something to say, but didn’t want to, for the sake of the rest.

Chika wore a smile — one too wide and too stretched and too _fake_ to be actually considered genuinely happy — the whole time, when she said she was okay with how things turned out, and even during the following silence itself, where she opted to stare out the window instead of talk to everyone like she usually did.

Her eyes, on the other hand, had been the dullest red that Ruby had ever seen on the optimistic and cheery girl’s expression.

It was a little unnerving to see Chika like that.

Dia had been waiting for them at the station — with that forbearing smile of hers again — and the first thing Ruby did the moment she spotted her was to run and wail in her arms, too long and too loud, ignoring her schoolmates who had been right there, listening to her, and feeling their hearts stir as well.

Her sister didn’t let go — she only clutched harder and hugged her sister instead, “You did your best.”

( For once, she didn’t feel embarrassed to be doing so, because everyone else knew, and they would understand.

Maybe they felt the same way too. )

Once they had all settled down, waiting for their respective families to pick them up, Dia narrated the story of her own group’s performance at Tokyo.

They were enthusiastic too, they prepared well too, they practice a whole lot too.

It all ended with — _We couldn’t sing_.

( As Dia said that, Ruby _still_ felt that wasn’t what actually happened. Memories of the livestream, and their defeated faces that had already given up on the idea of performing at all, resurfaced. )

“It’s great that you all had been able to sing in the first place” Dia remarked, but it hadn’t done anything to lift their spirits at all.

The current Aqours collectively realised the intentions behind Dia’s actions from when they started out — they understood the meaning behind _You only succeeded because of previous school idols, and the town’s goodwill_ — and You voiced all their thoughts out loud, “That’s why you were so against the idea…”

She knew this would happen, and she tried to stop them from repeating history.

It didn’t work.

Later that night, Ruby rehearsed their choreography alone in her room instead of sleeping, tripping occasionally to end up falling on her bed.

The last time she fell, she stayed there on the bed, and stared up at the full moon hanging in the sky while wondering, _Where did we go wrong?_

 

The next morning, they were all standing right in the middle of the waters, hugging and crying and laughing because _finally, Chika’s letting it all out_ — Ruby made a small promise to herself amidst the occasion.

She wouldn’t give up.

 

* * *

 

 

The drama in 3-A reached each and every corner of the school.

Crowds of third-years and second-years, and some first-years too, gathered around to watch the scene that was occurring within the class.

If one were to be looking at the sight, one would see the school’s director clinging to another student as if the world would end if she let go — both yelling about who-knew-what — while the student council president stood at the side and stared the two fighting away like cats and dogs, occasionally warning them about others watching, but mostly watching them herself.

Ruby and Hanamaru had already been witnessing it all when the second-years of Aqours arrived at the scene, You holding a white-and-blue uniform that was so, so familiar, and Chika walking upfront to the seniors and telling them to meet her after school.

 _The Talk After School_ , it seemed, had barely yielded anything new besides the _We couldn’t sing_ story, and Ruby was becoming more and more dubious about the event Kanan and Dia narrated hand in hand, as time went by.

( The words Kanan and Mari on Benten Island the other day seemed to convey something entirely different.

Ruby could only guess at what _Have you finally given up on running away?_ meant, in their context. )

Kanan had left early, to the dismay of Chika and Mari, but Riko’s great observation and Yoshiko’s great human-capturing abilities had them trap the only one left who definitely knew what was actually going on.

At the Kurosawa’s, Dia fessed up as she rubbed her neck, “We didn’t sing on purpose.”

And it was then that all of Ruby’s suspicions had been confirmed, and the whole story began to make a lot more sense when _We couldn’t sing_ was replaced with _We didn’t sing on purpose_.

Mari had not been included in on the plan, which turned out to be a part of the plan itself.

They wanted her to pursue education abroad, like her peers and teachers and parents had, but she was so stuck to being a school idol that —

— they turned to ripped Aqours apart on _purpose_ , so she would finally see that she had better opportunities than being stuck in the small, tiny town of Uchiura, and left.

With a declaration of, “I’m going to _slug_ her!” Mari ran out of the house and out into the rain.

The rest followed afterwards, when the storm had ended.

( Ruby made sure to carry the outfit sitting in her closet for two long years, before leaving. )

Dia was already there when they had arrived, closing the school gates, while they hid behind the wall just adjacent.

Chika sneaked up behind her, as planned, trying to convince her to join alongside her fellow third-years as well, swatting away the excuses of _I’m too busy_ and _I have council work to do_ from the senior instantly, and ensuring her that they would all be there to help her out.

“My dear sister,” Ruby stepped forward when her sister noticed them standing in a cluster surrounding the wall, clutching Dia’s costume in hand, “welcome to Aqours!”

She held it in front of her with a smile.

 

Dia’s eyes softened, and she reciprocated the smile, as if saying —

_Thank you._

and

_I’ll do my best for you, for all of us._

 

* * *

 

 

( Later, the night of the summer festival, they learned after their performance of _未熟DREAMER_ that it _was_ Dia who wrote _Aqours_ that day, on the sand, for the second-years, after all.

Ruby couldn’t help but laugh at the fact, because —

 _Dia_ had _supported them from the very start_

— and Ruby was so, so glad. )

**Author's Note:**

> leave some suggestions if you want maybe?? i'd really appreciate some help with my poor writing lol
> 
> i'll also probably edit this a couple of times so if you spot some typos or weird sentences just lemme know so i can fix 'em
> 
> hope you guys liked it !! maybe i'll post something again soon


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